Before the Last Battle
by urundermispell
Summary: Finding the Horcruxes and the suspence of the last few moments before the battle between Harry and Voldemort.


Harry was felling rather lonely after Dumbledore's death, but this emotion was much weaker then the one that wanted revenge. And he was going to get it, no matter if it would be the last thing he would do. He hated Voldemort and now he hated Snape just as much and he would be both of their deathbeds. And this Harry swore on his father's grave.

And so on his word, he set out to finish what he and Dumbledore had started. This had proven itself to be difficult, but with the help of his to best friends in the whole world, it wasn't as bad. Firstly Harry decided that he wanted to track down the other 3 Horcruxes, to destroy them and then find out who R.A.B. is and to see if he truly had destroyed the locket Horcrux.

They found Helga Hufflepuff's cup in a cavern in a mountain. A place near the settlement of Giants that took to Voldemorts's side long ago. Hermione had thought of this, as usual. She thought aloud one day saying " If when Voldemort was making his Horcruxes he had the giants on his side, why wouldn't he hide it among where they live. The Giants wouldn't go near it, wizards would stay away from the Giants and naturally the Giants would kill any muggle that went near enough. It all fits!" And as usual Hermione was right. We found the cup a month later!

Next up was the object that was once owned by either Ravenclaw or Gryffindor, which we found to be Ravenclaw's necklace. This we found in Voldemort's old abandoned orphanage, in his bedroom. The place had been vacant for at least 20 years and it seems that Voldemort put an Unplottable charm on it as well as a charm that made its purpose much like the one of the Room of Requirements at Hogwarts, but it only new of one requirement, to visit the orphanage. This took Harry, Ron, and Hermione 3 weeks to figure out whom to word what they needed, but as soon as they did it took them mere hours to retrieve the necklace.

Now it was time to get Voldemort's snake, Nagini, which was promising to be the most difficult to find because she never left Voldemort's side and he was almost impossible to locate at this time in the War of good and evil. But, with Hermione at Harry's side, Harry knew this would be possible. It took them 5 months and 3 weeks to figure out where Voldemort and his snake were, but when they did they had a plan and were ready to put it to work. They had to cause a distraction large enough for Voldemort to leave Nagini's side. The plan worked, with help from some of the Order, but only just. And we nearly had a lose, Hagrid's half-brother Grawp, but we fortunately, after we ALL held on to part of him, were about to Side-A-Long Aparrate him out of there. He lost a finger though, and wasn't too happy about it.

Well, now, after all that they had been through together, they had one last thing to do before they could be sure that Voldemort was mortal. They had to find this R.A.B. person. They had, of course, already started researching from the information given on this man, but so far were unsuccessful. It took them a year and 3 months (including the time it took them to find the other 3 Horcruxes) to figure out whom he was and if he truly had destroyed the 4th Horcrux. It turns out that he was actually a she, Rachael Andra Bartrenese. She was a muggle-born, and had little connection with the wizarding world. But she fought against Voldemort alone in small but great strikes of magic. The only connection to the wizarding world that she did have was a few single paragraphs in some old magazine called "The Helping Hand", a magazine with the sole purpose of letting witches and wizards know of the little winnings against evil during the days of Voldemort. She apparently liked to work and be alone because that was the only contacts we could find on her in the wizarding world. But when they did further study in the muggle world, on the electronic thing muggles call a computer, they found her last living relative, her brother. His name was Tim Grant Bartrenese. Tim knew all about his sister being a witch and was grateful for it; he had been very close to his sister. The only one she ever was close too. He told them that Rachael informed him of Voldemort and how she was the only one who knew he used Horcruxes and how Rachael had destroyed one of them. Tim then told them that Bellatrix Lestrange killed Rachael, when Voldemort found out that she was working against him, though he never found out she knew about his Horcruxes. Harry had asked him for the locket to see if it was true, and Tim gave it to him. And it was indeed Slytherin's locket. Harry told him that the man who had Rachael killed would soon come to his end. And with this Harry could tell that the man could not thank him enough, so he merely smiled and told him to keep the locket and good luck.

Harry, Hermione, and Ron were on their way to the last battle, the one that would end the prophecy, but before they entered what might be their doom Harry stopped. He would not allow Ron and Hermione ruin their lives to help him. They had helped him enough, by finding and destroying the last 4 Horcruxes. He had lost to many already and was not going to lose them too. So he turned around to face them to tell them this.

"Hold on for a moment, I can't let you do this. I can't allow you to come with me. I have lost too many people, and I don't want to lose you two. And I just wanted to say that I'm so glad that we are friends and that you are about to be more than that," Harry had a feeble smile while saying this.

"Look Harry, we have been through nearly everything with you and we have yet to leave your side. This is the most important danger we have entered yet and we are not going to leave you here to face this alone, we will never leave you," said Hermione with determination.

"Yea, Harry mate, we aren't going to leave you. Hermione's right, and any way this is going to be one of the greatest battles of all history! Do you think we'd want to miss out on this," said Ron smiling.

Harry couldn't help smiling as he stood there with the people he loved most. As much as he wanted them to save their own lives, he wanted them to be there with him.

So he decided to say, "All right then lets show Voldemort and Snape and all his other Death Eaters how the wining side fights." But as they began to walk again after looking at each other's determined faced, he heard cracking noises. Harry turned around and saw McGonagall standing there with Tonks, Lupin, Hagrid, Grawp (who now was like an extra large Hagrid),Mr. Weasley, Mrs. Weasley, Bill, Charley, Mad-eye, Diggle, Dodge, Ms. Figg, Aberforth (Dumbledore's brother), Sturgis, Kingsley, Fred, George, Neville, Luna (Longbottom), and Ginny Potter (the one person Harry was most determined to protect by killing Voldemort).

"Thought you'd like some company Potter," said McGonagall smiling widely.

Ginny ran up to Harry and gave him a hug and a kiss, then said "O Harry, I know you wanted me to stay in hiding, but I'm not letting you do this alone. So I got every one that I could get from the Order. And well every one came!"

"I…I…. ok. Well then lets go, for Dumbledore, Sirius, and my mum and dad," said Harry feeling as though nothing could stop him now. With his smiled at Ginny and the others one last time, then led the way to the last battle, as Harry was seeing it, for Voldemort.


End file.
